Doors, drawer fronts and boxes already hanging in the room are degreased, sanded, primed for their own material and sprayed with a hard new colour. Kitchen cabinet painting leaves layout, counters, backsplash and plumbing untouched.
Kitchens here range from post-war face-frame boxes in the old Yonge Street blocks of Crosby and Mill Pond, through the golden oak of Bayview Hill and Doncrest, to thermofoil in the newer streets off Elgin Mills Road. Each of those materials wants its own primer, so painting oak and work on thermofoil and melamine each get a page here.
Every Cabinet Painting Job Runs Through The Same Nine Steps
Tag, degrease, sand, fill, prime, sand, spray, sand, spray. That order is the whole of cabinet painting, and no step is dropped to save a day. Doors and drawer fronts are taken off first, numbered by position so every hinge returns to its own holes and no door lands in the wrong opening.
Degreasing comes next, with a cleaner strong enough to lift the wax and cooking oil that build up on a kitchen used three times a day. Paint laid over that residue releases within months. Sanding then knocks the sheen back to a dull, even surface that primer can bite into.
Primer depends on the substrate. Oak and cherry get shellac to hold tannin back. Melamine, laminate and thermofoil get a bonding primer. Maple, MDF and doors that were painted before take a standard cabinet primer. Then two or three thin topcoats go on, sanded between, and that is where cabinet painting earns its life or loses it.
A Cabinet Painting Quote Names Every Piece Of The Work
Doors and drawer fronts get counted apart from boxes and end panels. The written quote records the material, names the primer and topcoat family, gives sheen and coat count, states whether grain filling or a bonding primer applies, and prices each element. Islands, pantries, crown moulding and cabinet interiors sit on separate lines, ready to be added or dropped.
A single lump sum for a kitchen compares with nothing and leaves room for extras later. The visit behind our cabinet painting quote runs about half an hour at no charge. Doors are opened to check the hinge side, the cabinet under the sink is looked over for swelling, and colour comes up.
Three Days On Site And About Two Weeks From Start To Finish
Most kitchen cabinet painting means two or three days on site inside a two-week stretch. Removal, masking, degreasing and sanding take the first day. Boxes are primed and sprayed behind containment over the next day or two, and the doors stay at the booth for seven to ten days, being primed, filled, sprayed and then left to harden.
Open boxes stand in as shelving through that stretch, with every appliance connected. Reinstallation, hinge adjustment and hardware take one more day. Why the doors leave the house at all is explained on the cabinet spray painting page.
Dry In Hours, Cured In Weeks
Waterborne alkyd enamel goes touch-dry within a few hours, handles ordinary use about a week on and hits full hardness around day thirty. A 2K polyurethane arrives there much sooner and is close to fully cured inside a day. Either way the early weeks want soft cloths and no abrasives. Chips on the cutlery drawer and at handle height nearly always trace back to heavy use before curing ended, which is why cabinet painting here finishes with written care notes.
On-Site Cabinet Painting Needs Containment, Not Luck
Poly and tape seal every opening in the room being sprayed, the floor is covered, vents are masked over, and an extractor draws air out of the space rather than through the house. Without that, overspray settles two rooms away.
The doors still come off. Pantry doors, laundry cabinet doors and the fronts off a built-in ride to the booth exactly as kitchen doors do, and only fixed frames and shelves take their cabinet painting in place. That split is what keeps the finish on the fixed work as smooth as the finish on the doors.
Filled Holes Show Through Cabinet Painting Unless They Are Done Properly
A hole filled with the wrong material telegraphs as a dimple, or as a faint circle, the first time light crosses the door. Wood filler shrinks as it dries, so the fill goes in slightly proud, gets sanded flush after it cures, and then gets primed like the rest of the door.
That sequence belongs inside the cabinet painting schedule rather than beside it. Filling comes before primer, the primed fill gets checked under a work light, and any hollow spot gets a second pass before the topcoat goes anywhere near it. Skipping that step is why so many repainted kitchens show ghost holes beside every handle.
Kitchen Cabinet Painting Prices Follow The Ontario Market
Across Ontario, cabinet painting a whole kitchen most often falls between $2,500 and $5,500. Small kitchens begin near $1,500, and anything large or two-tone reaches $6,000 to $9,000 or more. Per door the figure sits near $130 to $250. Extras lift the total: grain fill across oak, a bonding primer under thermofoil, or a jump into a deep colour. Those are market ranges, not a price list.
Book A Free Cabinet Painting Visit In Richmond Hill
Phone +1 (289) 201-7168 or use the form with an approximate door count and the part of the city you live in, whether Oak Ridges, Jefferson, Langstaff or out toward Gormley. The written quote lands one or two days afterward and the written quote sets the price. Our other cabinet painting work, from islands through to built-ins, starts on the home page.
Kitchen Cabinet Painting Questions
How long does kitchen cabinet painting take?
Most kitchens need two or three days on site inside a two-week stretch. Boxes are sprayed in the house, while doors spend seven to ten days at the booth. Reinstallation, hinge adjustment and new hardware take one more day. Appliances stay connected the whole time.
Do the doors have to come off?
Yes. Hinges, hinge plates and door edges all need coating, and masking around a hung door leaves a visible line. Every door and drawer front comes off numbered by position, so each hinge returns to its own holes and each door to its own opening.
Which primer goes under the paint?
It depends on the material. Oak and cherry get shellac primer to hold tannin back. Melamine, laminate and thermofoil get a bonding primer. Maple, MDF and doors that were painted before take a standard cabinet primer. The quote names the primer before any work starts.